


Embers and Matches

by WeirdHybrid



Category: EXO (Band), GOT7, 방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M, Multiple Narrators, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-15
Updated: 2015-10-15
Packaged: 2018-04-26 10:59:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5002123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WeirdHybrid/pseuds/WeirdHybrid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Seokjin and Junmyeon have been neighbors since they were four, best friends since they were seven, and soul mates since they were sixteen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Junmyeon

     Seokjin and Junmyeon have been neighbors since they were four, best friends since they were seven, and soul mates since they were sixteen. To be fair, Junmyeon knew he and Seokjin had always been soul mates, but it was their shared awareness of that reality, discovered on Seokjin’s back porch at 6:12 in the morning, the two of them huddled together under tartan wool, feet dangling above dewy grass from their perch on the white-washed porch swing, that stood up in Junmyeon’s memory. Now, at twenty-six years old, Junmyeon lived his life in tandem with Seokjin, their souls interwoven and blended like watercolors, each soft and complementary to its partner.

     They’d kissed first when they were nine, two days before Junmyeon’s tenth birthday. Under almost-cartoonish clouds suspended in an invitingly blue sky, Seokjin had jumped off Junmyeon’s tire swing at its zenith, flying for a brief, blissful moment before plummeting to the rocky grass, rolling a bit on impact. Junmyeon still remembers the eerie seconds of silence as he’d crouched beside his friend, Seokjin’s fiery brown irises drowning in a pool of shiny white, his eyes blown wide in panic. He had shuddered, blinked, and gasped in a rattling breath, then another, before bursting into tears. Seokjin was always more likely to cry than Junmyeon, but never in their twenty-two years together had Junmyeon gotten used to the shredded feeling in his chest when Seokjin hung his head, his handsome features split by jagged tear tracks. Similarly, never in their twenty-two years together could Junmyeon find a better way to quiet Seokjin’s sobs than with a kiss, the first time a tentative, rushed press of lips to Seokjin’s hot, wet cheek, then, once he’d turned to Junmyeon in surprise, another, just as rushed, to his small lips, parted and still and willing.

     But now, watching his soul mate weep into his cupped, strained hands in the passenger seat, the engine long-quieted and the chill of late fall creeping into the silence, Junmyeon knew there was nothing he could do, nothing he could say to stop Seokjin’s pain. How could he, when he was the one to cause it?


	2. Yugyeom

     “Yugy, don’t forget to – ”

     “Set out the programs? Done.”

     “R-right. Great. And the – ”

     “The reserved seating signs are already in place, and Sehun’s going to usher from the south entrance so I can stay up here.”

     “Oh. Super. Well, just be sure – ”

     “I turned on the AC an hour ago, so it should be about right when we open the doors.”

     “Yugy, don’t take this the wrong way, because I appreciate the work you do and you’re a great employee or whatever, but… let me finish a single goddamn sentence, would you? I’m your senior. It’s rude to interrupt.” Yugyeom nodded and subtly hunched his broad shoulders a little, compensating for his impressive height on his shorter manager’s behalf.

     “Sorry, Yoongi.”

     “Mhm.” Yoongi, the house manager of the dilapidated, old theatre, looked Yugyeom up and down with an assessing tilt to his perpetually sleepy eyes. “Where is Sehun anyway? I told him he needed to – ”

     “He had an appointment earlier, so I got the box office cleaned up. That’s… that’s what you were going to ask about, right?” Yugyeom asked sheepishly, pulling his bottom lip inside his mouth. Yoongi sighed.

     “You know, I’d be annoyed with you if I didn’t think you were probably a wizard. Or a fortune teller or some shit…” Yoongi’s voice tapered off as he pivoted in place, looking around the lobby, going over some checklist in his head. He turned back to Yugyeom, still standing at attention, a begrudging look of satisfaction on his round face. “Well, it looks like you’ve got everything under control. Again.”

     Yugyeom nodded, expression still diffident.

     “I was thinking I might go get something to eat before the show…”

     “Sure, sure.” Yoongi clapped a hand on Yugyeom’s solid shoulder. “Call’s at 6:15, door’s at 7:00, show’s at 8:00,” Yoongi recited more for his benefit than Yugyeom’s, who was always there a full half hour early for any scheduled shift. “You going to the sandwich place again? You mind – ”

     “There’s a club in the fridge. No tomato, extra bacon. And there are a couple of those coffee things you like in there, too.”

     “Fuck off, Yugy, seriously.” But Yoongi’s exasperated smile and wave of his hand as he turned to wander up the burgundy carpeted stairs to the office served as his typical gratitude. Dismissed and satisfied with the state of the theatre, Yugyeom snagged his ash gray Members Only jacket from the box office and set out the side door, an hour to kill before he was due back inside.

     The overcast weather suited his mood; he was one month into his junior year and his days were already filling up with unfocused study groups, tutoring the basketball team, and an uptick in the theatre’s demands. It wasn’t the busyness he minded so much; truthfully, he tended to thrive with a full calendar, his natural efficiency driving him through task after task. But with classes occupying his mornings and either work or his social life bleeding from afternoon into evening (and sometimes morning again, if he felt uncharacteristically irresponsible), his need for time to himself grew more urgent; he needed room to breathe away from students, co-workers, friends.

     Sometimes, before heading off to class in the morning, he rode the almost-always-empty bus for its full forty-five-minute loop, enjoying the rhythmic lull of the engine. Other times he’d walk the three and a half back to his apartment from the theatre once the patrons had all gone home, their rumpled programs and creased ticket stubs discarded under the velvet chairs or on the bathroom counters. His favorite though, was to get to work early, locking the staff entrance behind him, and climb up the narrow iron stairs behind an unmarked door to the ancient theatre’s catwalk. He loved the air up there, cool and old and welcoming to only the most technically savvy staff or, in Yugyeom’s case, the more curious ones. He’d walk toward the middle of the flat metal path, avoiding the cumbersome, precarious spotlights and extension cords, and sit, legs dangling down over the edge of the walk, arms hooked around the railings, leaning out above the unlit, cavernous space, and just be. Just for a while.

     Sometimes he’d bring his headphones, a bulky black set Jimin, his roommate, gifted him for his birthday their freshman year (“Yugy, I respect your right to listen to that highfalutin funeral music, but I swear, I’ll hang myself with one of your ridiculous flannel shirts if _I_ have to listen to it anymore.”), one of several meticulously organized playlists filling his ears, lulling his eyes closed, but usually he just enjoyed the silence, the vacuum. The best was when it rained, the distant rumble of thunder and the more immediate flat smack of rain flooding the theatre’s clogged gutters providing a comforting environment in the dark auditorium.

     Today though, this weather, demanded music. Specifically Debussy. Yugyeom paused outside the theatre doors and scrolled through his library, thumbing the familiar path to his four-hour-long playlist, and chose the top track. He inhaled, then the lilting swell of piano seeped through him, the playful, expansive melody easing his mind into a familiar quiet. He let the first minute play, his body respectfully still, then he set off, his worn combat boots treading up the street.

     Fourteen minutes later, Yugyeom found himself, unsurprisingly though not entirely consciously, approaching his favored café. He’d found the place last year when Jimin had forced him to abandon their usual coffee joint (something about Jimin leaving his underwear on the bathroom floor of the orange-haired barista’s dorm; Yugyeom didn’t care to internalize the details), and it ended up being exactly the sort of haven Yugyeom needed.

     The external façade was modern, clean, all brushed silver and dark wood, and through the massive floor-to-ceiling windows stood rows and rows of books, beautifully organized in linear shelves, separated by small, square tables bookended by pairs of leather chairs. More important than the sophisticated, trendy aesthetic, though, was the coffee (rich, dark, and not exorbitantly expensive), the owner (a thoughtful, charming guy by the name of Minseok, sympathetic enough to the plight of the poor college student to offer Yugyeom a discount), and the music (Debussy, Rachmaninoff, Chopin).

     Yugyeom ducked inside, slipping his headphones down onto his neck and pausing _Hommage A Rameau_.

     “Yugyeom! Who’s on tonight? Opera? Jazz quartet? Arrogant, beret-wearing beat poet?”

     Yugyeom pocketed his phone and approached the counter where Minseok stood, all sleek hair and well-tailored black clothes, consulting a clipboard and grinning.

     “Uh, tonight’s actually a cellist. A prodigy, apparently. I hadn’t heard of her, but I found a few recordings online. She’s good,” Yugyeom replied, returning the smile. “You coming by?”

     “Inventory tonight, unfortunately, though I’m not big into solo cello, to be honest. A little too…”

     “I know what you mean. I’m curious how one fills an hour with just cello.”

     “Let me know how it goes, huh?” Minseok slipped the clipboard onto the counter behind him. “The usual?” Yugyeom nodded.

     “Large, if you don’t mind. Remember, I have to stand through an hour of cello.”

     “Quite right.”

     They chatted while Minseok moved easily around the various fizzing, steaming contraptions, discussing the fall lineup at the theatre and the varying success of Minseok’s new hires (“There’s one who calls himself Dino… is that some new slang I should know about?”), before Minseok handed Yugyeom his mug, waving off his money for the third time that month.

     Yugyeom bowed slightly and made his way toward his normal seat, the bulky, brown armchair framed on either side by a window and the vintage encyclopedias selection (rarely was Yugyeom ever bothered by customers from this particular seat). But as Yugyeom walked past the photography book shelves, he saw his seat was taken.

     A youngish man (maybe twenty-four? twenty-five?), surrounded by what appeared to be the contents of his gaping leather bag which lie half stuffed under the chair by his feet, notebooks, stacks of papers, and post-its acting as a moat around him, sat folded up in Yugyeom’s favorite chair, his thread-thin, round glasses perched on his handsome nose under a flop of dark brown hair. He was supremely focused, straight brows furrowed, sharp eyes flitting over a yellowed sheet of… music. Interest peaked, Yugyeom scanned the room, choosing a table diagonal from the studious stranger, angled enough to watch him without being too obvious, the six-foot distance decent enough for snooping.

     Yugyeom sipped his coffee, the heat of it sinking into his hands and lips as he watched the guy continue his work. He seemed to be keeping time, his chin bobbing to an unheard rhythm, as he shuffled through his papers, most of which Yugyeom identified as sheet music with the aid of the dim afternoon light through the window. A pencil snuck its way up behind his ear occasionally, yanked down again to make some note or erase another. Yugyeom tried to decipher the subject of his work by snooping out the materials on the floor: a stapled list of contacts, a standard weekly calendar with illegible gold lettering on the front, a small stack of slightly rumpled papers, marked judiciously with red pen, and several bound collections of sheet music, various composers and themes overlapping each other around the young man’s feet.

     Yugyeom sipped his coffee, curiosity warming him now that his beverage was lukewarm. His eyes catalogued each detail, starting with the papers and the tabbed scores the man considered as he gnawed the side of lip, then shifting to the man himself, including his equally cute and dorky glasses, his classic jawline, his thick knit sweater, sleeves rolled up past his bony elbows. His phone, housed in a plain red case, which was suddenly buzzing from the pocket of his plaid slacks. Yugyeom licked his lip, listening.

     “Hey… mhm… Yeah, we just have to pick them up there tonight… Right… Oh no… really? Do you want me to... I don’t mind… Are you sure?... Okay, well text me if you need anything… Okay… Yeah, thanks… Mhm, me too… Bye.”

     The guy sighed as he ended the call, stuffing the phone back in his pocket. Yugyeom watched him worry his bottom lip between his teeth again, then reach up to rake his fingers through his shiny, dark hair. And then there they were, his sharp brown eyes meeting Yugyeom’s own.

     Yugyeom started, caught in his unapologetic staring. He turned away, looking down at his own empty table ( _why_ didn’t he have a book or something?), before grasping for his own phone.

     6:04pm, it read.

     Yugyeom groaned internally. He was never late. _Ever._ He pushed back in his chair and moved to the door quickly, answering Minseok’s wave with one of his own before exiting out onto the gray street. He let his eyes adjust for a second, shoving his headphones up over his ears, then scrolled through his library again, finding something to fit his current flustered state better than Debussy.

     The thumping beat behind Chris Brown’s enviable vocals kicked in too loud, further agitating Yugyeom, but he started off anyway, back toward the theatre. Four, five, six rushed steps away from the door, he risked looking up at the café. The windows were reflecting the rolling clouds for the most part, a heavy evening setting in, but Yugyeom thought he saw the thin outline of glasses facing the window, maybe even a little smile behind the thick, mirrored glass.


End file.
